Full Tilt Mass Market Paperback – September 1, 2004

4.5/5Wow, what a thrill ride! I loved this book from front to back.Blake has always been the responsible one in his group of friends. When he and his besties are visiting a local theme park they receive a strange invitation to another nearby amusement park. This invitation is all but forgotten until Blake's brother Quinn enters a coma later that night, clutching the invitation in his hands. Determined to find a way to bring his brother out of his comatose state, Blake and his friends journey to the mysterious theme park in the middle of the night, embarking on a chilling adventure into their darkest nightmares.Being an adrenaline junkie when it comes to theme parks, the premise of this book immediately gripped me. The fantasy and horror elements of this novel morphed your average rides into terrifying battles for survival, and I enjoyed every minute of it. There was plenty of action and developments in every chapter that left me sitting on the edge of my seat, and I couldn't get enough.Blake is responsible and cautious, and through his personal journey in this novel we learn of his haunted past. It was endearing to see him battle his demons in a real way. It's never easy, and he is constantly battling his doubts and concerns to keep himself and his friends alive. Quinn was a great little brother and was chaotic and fun loving. This created a great tension between the brothers that felt authentic. Even Maggie and Russ were entertaining side characters that kept things lively.Full of chills and thrills, this novel is a great read for younger readers looking to dip their toes into horror fiction or adults hankering for a bookish Halloween snack.

The book is on point!!! Great author!!!

How many of us judge a book by its cover?As much as I hate to admit it, I do. Frequently, actually.This is one of those occasions where I needed to remind myself that I’m not supposed to do that. I find the cover of Neal Shusterman’s Full Tilt absolutely atrocious, but I thoroughly enjoyed the story.Full Tilt is a young adult horror novel that takes place at the night-time carnival of your nightmares.The novel focuses on two brothers, Blake and Quinn. Quinn has obvious emotional and anger problems and doesn’t quite fit in with Blake and his friends. One night, Blake, Quinn, and Blake’s friends Maggie and Russ go to a theme park together. At one of the game booths, Blake is approached by a mysterious woman who hands him an invitation to a secret, night-time carnival.Blake has no intention of going until he finds his brother Quinn passed out with the invitation in his pocket. Blake believes that Quinn has left his body and gone to the carnival. Obviously, you have to suspend your belief with this novel, but it’s very well done.Blake, Maggie, and Russ show up at the secret carnival, where they are told they have to finish all seven rides before dawn. This seems simple enough… at first. As they proceed through the carnival they realize that the rides have deadly and mind-altering consequences. People that don’t make it out of the park by dawn or that get lost during one of the rides is stuck in the carnival forever, becoming a literal part of it.Blake, who ends up facing most of the rides alone, is determined to save Quinn from becoming part of the carnival. At the same time, however, he also has to come face to face with a horrific part of his past.I believe Full Tilt is the first young adult horror novel I’ve ever read. The tone of the story is such that you can definitely tell it’s written for readers around high school age. Even though bits of the story may have felt too young for me at times, I still enjoyed the ride (ahem).I thought the representation of PTSD was solid, as Blake has immense trouble coping with an event that happened when he was young. As fun as this novel was, it still dealt with a serious condition that you don’t often see in young adult novels. Aside from PTSD, it also dealt with depression (Quinn’s) and divorce.The character development of Blake and Quinn is solid, although the side characters aren’t nearly as well-developed. Part of the reason why this novel is so enticing is due to the brotherly relationship between Blake and Quinn, who are vastly different and rarely see eye-to-eye.“The park tapped into our longings, our fears, our habits, and our choices. This minefield had been perfectly, strategically, placed to cause the most damage if Quinn and I followed our normal patterns of behavior when we encountered it. So much of my life had been under tight control. So much of Quinn’s life had been wild insanity. What we needed now was both: a directed burst of controlled insanity.”Although I have purchased a copy of Neal Shusterman’s Scythe, I haven’t gotten around to reading it yet, so Full Tilt was my introduction to his writing. I enjoyed this book enough to find myself interested in his other novels.If you’re looking for a short, fast-paced, young adult horror novel, look no further. Full Tilt will be perfect for you.

The book Full Tilt, by Neal Shusterman, is a story about Blake, a 16-year-old kid who is forced to face his worst fears.Blake is an over-cautious, studious teenager. He is on the swim team, debate team, and just received a scholarship to Columbia University in New York, where he will be skipping his whole senior year of high school. As Blake describes himself, “I’m the constant. Constantly studying, constantly busy, constantly shuttling from swim team to debate team to home with the regularity of a celestial clock.” And Blake is terrified of roller coasters. When Blake was 7 years old he was in a bus accident where he was the only survivor, and while he does not remember the accident, this has shaped his fears. Blake and his younger brother, Quinn, are like polar opposites. Quinn is rebellious, a risk taker, and the two brothers fight frequently. Blake does not think very highly of his brother, calling Quinn a “waste of life.”One day, Blake, Quinn, and their friends, Maggie and Russ, go to an amusement park together. Blake has a secret crush on Maggie, and Russ is Maggie’s boyfriend. While at the park, Blake meets a girl named Cassandra that is working at one of the prize booths. Cassandra is beautiful and Blake finds himself flirting with her. Blake wins a prize from her booth, a stuffed bear. Inside the bear’s pocket is an invitation to another amusement park. When Blake turns around to say something to Cassandra about the invitation, she is mysteriously gone, and the guy standing in her place has no idea who Cassandra is or what Blake is talking about.When they get home that night, Blake finds his mom out front with Carl, “boyfriend of the month,” Mom and boyfriend make an announcement that they are engaged to be married. Blake and his brother are less than enthusiastic, as they have both suffered from abandonment and abuse from their own father as well as from the long list of their mother’s boyfriends. After going to bed that night, Blake awakens suddenly from a nightmare he is having about the bus accident again, “Screaming. Spinning out of control. Gripping tightly on to the seat. So dizzy…” It’s 2:00 in the morning. Something wasn’t right, “Strange light flashed through the blinds.” An ambulance is parked in the driveway. His brother, Quinn, is lying on the couch in what seems to be a coma. As the paramedics place Quinn on the gurney, something falls off the couch: a stuffed bear! “The pocket was empty. The invitation was gone.” Blake thinks there has to be a logical explanation for this. As he peers into his brother’s eyes, he swears he sees the reflection of spinning carnival lights, calliope music and screams, and he thinks back to what his brother has whispered before, “I go places.”Blake just knows that somehow Quinn has stolen his invitation and gone to the amusement park. Blake convinces his friends, Russ and Maggie, to go with him to the park in search of Quinn.They arrive at the park, which has no name and is mysteriously set up in a quarry. The park should not have been open at this later hour, but it was. At the entrance, there was a cashier and security guard that demanded they have a written invitation in order to enter. When Blake insists that his little brother took his invitation and is inside the park, he receives confirmation that his brother has been in the park for about one hour! A mark mysteriously appears on their right hand, which gives them access to the park and to the rides. The park rules are they have to ride on exactly seven rides before dawn in order to get out of the park alive.Once inside the park, Blake sees Cassandra! Somehow he knows she owns the place. He follows her onto a Carousel ride (and his friends follow him). But this isn’t your ordinary carousel ride – the animals become real and next thing Blake knows, he’s riding a real lion in a stampede! Each of the rides seems to become real and addresses their worst fears and insecurities, like the hall of mirrors that changes people into a reflection of their evil or bad side. They must find a way to get off of each ride alive or risk being trapped at the park forever.Only Blake makes it through all seven rides by dawn and is free to leave the park, but refuses to leave without his brother or friends. He makes a deal with Cassandra that if he goes on one more ride, they would all be free to go. The last ride represents Blake’s deepest fear: the school bus.The park experience has brought Blake and his brother closer together, and before he goes on the ride, his brother, Quinn, says, to him, “I’m just wondering…did I ever tell you that I love you?”Blake begins the ride when suddenly he is, “-spinning out of control. A doomed school bus on an icy day…..I am seven. I am there. This is not just a ride, I am there!” This ride forces Blake to remember what happened that day on the school bus, a memory he has long suppressed. The ride keeps restarting itself over and over again until Blake finally remembered what happened that day. “The bus is perfectly balanced on the edge of the cliff. Balanced. I am the balance.” Blake opens the back door and jumps out just before the school bus slides off the cliff.Next thing he knows, Blake wakes up. He’s in his car. He and Maggie and Russ have all been in a car accident. Apparently, they had an accident on the way to the amusement park, and it was all a dream. Yet Blake and his friends all have the same memory of it.

The beginning and the premise were interesting and that's all the positive thing that could be said about this book. Overall, this book was neither scary nor thrilling. It's just a waste of time and money. Not looking forward to read anything by the same author in future.

Just wasn't my cup of tea. Heard great things about it and many have said they like the story but for me it was hard to get into, predictable and a little boring